On Finnish-Swedishness and alienation

So I went out to dinner with my classmates today, and amongst all the beer and talk about the virtues of Perl, C#, Python and unit testing and whatnot (I dunno if I've been spoilt by a year abroad filled with wider conversation topics or what, but *one* hour of shop-talk should be more than enough, surely? Or maybe I'm a just a horrible failure of a computer scientist.), there was one bit of genuine insight that struck a nerve.

One of the guys observed about his summer working in Germany, where he was the lone Finnish-Swede amongst a bunch of Finns, that what growing up in the mostly swedish parts of Finland (there's a bunch of them along the west coast, fact fans, especially in the middle part) uniquely prepares you for is being in a place where you don't understand what the hell anyone's saying. Everyone else was freaking out, but for him, it was business as usual.

And it's true, you know. I grew up in a shitty little village where something like ninety percent of the peopulation speaks Swedish. You simply don't need or hear Finnish in your day-to-day life, but unless you're some inbred navel-gazing yokel whose greatest ambition in life is to take over his father's pigsty, you're very much aware of the huge swathes of country where they don't speak like you at all. Point is: you're not 100% at ease in a lot of places in your country, so going abroad is not that big of a deal.

Which I believe accounts for how easily I got by in Japan at the start, despite the dire warnings from various exchange studies booklets. Sure, the customs are different, but the whole bit about only understanding the odd word here and there was just like being ten years old again and going somewhere Finnish, with their strange and terrible language that defies mortal comprehension. You just roll with it.

Or maybe not. I am after all a bit DUNK! after all that beer.

Requiem

So these last couple of days have been less than excellent. I was going to go on a longwinded account of every sniffle, quivering lip and stoic stare into the middle distance from the moment I looked down on the train to the airport and saw "Vicki" on the side of a plastic bag, causing my brain to go into an endless repeat of the list people I might never see again, to the final kick in the teeth of waking up in my dead-end hometown with not a living soul about.

But bollocks to that.

I've done more than enough such rubbish already, and whining and moping doeth not a dashing gentleman make.

Besides, I'm all better now. Through judicious application of music magic, mainly consisting of Kenickie's Robot Song on endless repeat and assorted dehumanizing industrial music, especially Front Line Assembly's Tactical Neural Implant, as well as a momentarily crippling addiction to Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines, I am now returned to my normal detached, cynical persona with none of those moist fleshy bits interfering with my reasoning. Huzzah!

So: onwards! Towards...the future! And whatever happens, there will be no fucking crying.

But first, an illustrated guide one-picture summary of why the last year was pretty damn glorious:

So it appears I am going to learn salsa

Tonight, I went with Leo and a bunch of other guys to a salsa club. Leo is Cuban, a brain surgeon and generally a marvel of a man, and no less so on the dance floor. I know not a lick of salsa except for what he taught me at the dorm's Christmas party oh-so-long ago, but most of us are in the same boat, no matter where you go with Leo you end up having fun, so that's ok.

At the club, us rubbish people end up feeling sort of self-conscious and awkward, to start with. A frightening amount of people seem to know what they're doing, but enough people kindly take pity on us and impart their wisdom for the night to mosey along quite nicely. Then there's a break. There's going to be a special show, the centerpiece of which is a girl who's freshly arrived from Cuba. It's sort of a welcoming thing for her, accepting her into the salsa community in Osaka and whatnot.

One Cuban salsa show and some spectacularly undulating hips later, me and my non-salsa capable friends look at each other and go: "Yeah. I think I'm going to join a salsa course when I get the chance."

All in all a good night then. I just wish Leo hadn't told us the girl in question was only eighteen.

I feel like a dirty old man now.